


building our kingdom

by dollsome



Category: Ideal Home (2018)
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-24
Updated: 2020-02-24
Packaged: 2021-02-27 22:08:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22872988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dollsome/pseuds/dollsome
Summary: Bill's surprising new interest in home cooking persists. Paul and Erasmus finally find out why. (Set after the film.)
Relationships: Paul Morgan/Erasmus Brumble
Comments: 14
Kudos: 59





	building our kingdom

**Author's Note:**

> Here I am, self-indulgently spending a little time in the universe of one of my favorite comfort movies, hooray! The ending of the movie always seems to imply what this story hinges on without actually stating it outright, so I decided to explore it a bit more in this tiny bantery feelings-fest about one of my favorite found families in fiction.
> 
> Also, I never expected the full-on honor of getting to type the name “Erasmus” this many times. And they say there’s nothing to look forward to so many years into your fanfic-writing career! Thank you, Andrew Fleming, for blessing us with these characters.
> 
> P.S. What’s the dealio with literally every fic I write in recent memory having a Paul Hollywood reference? I don’t know, but it’s where we’re at, pals. I just feel like he needs to be taken down a bit! Nobody's televised handshake is that important! (I mean, Mary Berry's would be, but that's neither here nor there.)
> 
> P.P.S. The title is taken from the very lovely song "Sons and Daughters" by Allman Brown and Liz Lawrence.

On Bill’s second night at home--officially at home, not-going-anywhere at home, Paul’s-heart-is-finally-starting-to-settle-down-in-his-chest at home--Erasmus casts a wistful glance around the kitchen, which has been getting a suspicious amount of use, and then generously suggests they go to Taco Bell to celebrate.

Bill, wonder of wonders, vetoes the idea.

“At this rate, Taco Bell’s going to go out of business,” Paul remarks.

“All those nice people in their little hats,” Erasmus adds with a sympathetic pout.

“Tell you what,” Bill says, very magnanimous. “We can go there in the morning for breakfast.”

“Perfect,” Erasmus says, pout transforming into a big shit-eating grin. “Paul loves breakfasting at Taco Bell.”

Paul glares at him, feeling a little surge of affection at how totally, consistently fucking annoying he is.

“But maybe,” Bill adds casually, “we could try to make something like Taco Bell at home tonight.”

“Ole!” Erasmus throws his arms up in celebration, absolutely toeing the line between enthusiasm and racism. “ _Fajitas de pollo_ it is!”

“I’ll help,” Bill says, watching Erasmus whirl around the kitchen collecting ingredients, “if you want.”

“We absolutely want,” Erasmus says. “Tell you what: you can keep an eye on Paul. He’s got no idea what he’s doing in the kitchen, the poor idiot. No natural culinary flair whatsoever.”

Paul flashes a saccharine smile. “Fuck you.”

Erasmus plants a kiss on his cheek as he swoops past to open the spice cabinet.

“Hey, buddy,” Paul says lightly to Bill, who’s standing at sous-chef attention, “first the pork tenderloin, now this. How’d you get so into homemade meals all of a sudden?”

“I dunno,” Bill replies. “I just did.”

Paul catches Erasmus’s eye; Erasmus shrugs.

“Well, okay then,” Paul says. “Very cool.”

“I’ll marinate the chicken. Your job is to help Paul chop these.” Erasmus drops a cornucopia of bell peppers and onions on the counter in front of them. “Make sure the old man doesn’t hack them into all different sizes like a barbarian, will you?”

He winks at Paul while Bill stares down at the array of vegetables. Paul rolls his eyes, but in a way that, for once, isn’t so hard it might induce a migraine.

They run through a little tutorial on knife safety, then get to work. Bill holds the knife just the way Paul told him to; his brow is furrowed, a determined-to-succeed expression on his face. It makes Paul understand briefly how disappointed his own parents must have been when he didn’t show much interest in any of the stuff they loved. (Then again, they mostly loved getting shitfaced, so he can’t feel too guilty.)

“Hey, those look great,” Paul says, nodding at the strips of chopped vegetables. “Have you done this before?”

“Nope,” Bill reports, sounding pleased.

“It’s in his blood, Paul,” Erasmus says very seriously.

“It must be,” Paul agrees.

A proud little smile sneaks onto Bill’s face as he keeps on chopping. At the sight of it, Paul smiles too, and looks up to find Erasmus beaming at the both of them while he slices raw chicken. Nobody should look that happy around raw chicken.

It’s the kind of moment Paul would have found totally sickening in theory a year ago. It’s the kind of moment that makes him almost sick with relief that he picked trying again over The fucking Rachel Ray Show.

(Sure, she’s super nice. But nice is overrated, and home is home.)

+

When they all sit down to eat a few hours later, a glorious spread of brightly colored food (and, in the grownups’ case, drinks) in front of them, the dining room table feels smaller than it has in months. Thank God they finally got rid of that damn orchid. Bill sits at the head of the table and Paul and Erasmus take the seats on either side of him. The seating’s totally off-balance, aesthetically speaking, but it’s cozy enough to be worth it. Erasmus rests his foot against Paul’s under the table. Lately they keep finding all of these little excuses to touch each other, something that Paul’d thought had died out after the first few years of their relationship.

They spend the meal chatting about Bill’s return to school and what to do over summer vacation (“Disneyland!” Bill suggests, sending a chill to the center of Paul’s soul) and the likelihood of getting a dog (sending an even worse chill to the center of Paul’s soul).

It’s funny, how kids are designed to want things endlessly, and how when you love them you feel the irrational urge to give all those things to them. No matter how jaded you are to the fact that life mostly sucks and lets you down, you want to stop them from ever having to find out too.

“I just don’t think we’re necessarily dog people,” Erasmus says, sipping his margarita.

“I’m definitely a dog person,” retorts Bill.

“Well, Paul and I, then. Believe me, we’ve tried and failed.”

“Failed?”

“Had to re-home the little guy,” Paul says hastily.

Erasmus widens his eyes from behind his gigantic margarita glass. Paul gives him a _Get it together!_ look.

“That’s dumb,” Bill says, undaunted. “Everybody’s a dog person. Dogs literally changed from wolves into dogs because people loved them so much and wanted them around. When I was still with my dad, I watched a show about it on that boring channel.”

“PBS?”

“Maybe.”

“It is a pretty boring channel,” Paul acknowledges. “Imagine your biggest draw being The Great British Bake-Off.”

“Please,” Erasmus scoffs. “Bake-Off is a worldwide phenomenon. They're going to invite me to judge one of these years; I can feel it.”

“ _Ooh, Victoria sponge! Ooh, tatty-byes!_ It’s drivel. So hey: you'll feel right at home there.”

“You’re just still smarting over that time Paul Hollywood hit on me.”

“He absolutely did not hit on you.”

“You certainly couldn’t get in between us fast enough at that party--”

“Yeah, to stop Paul Hollywood from filing a restraining order against you--”

“It was a real Battle of the Pauls. I might as well have flung you into a mud pit and made you wrestle. Which, come to think of it, actually sounds quite compelling--”

“I watched your show, too,” Bill says.

The bickering stops immediately. For a moment, the room goes totally silent. No chewing, no scraping of forks. Nothing.

“You did?” Paul finally asks.

“There wasn’t much else to do a lot of the time.” Bill pushes the black beans around on his plate. “When my dad was gone, or passed out. But the TV got the Food Network, so I watched you. Pretty much every day.”

“You did?” Erasmus says it this time, his voice wavering.

“It helped,” Bill says simply.

Erasmus swallows. “I’m glad.”

“We’re both glad,” Paul says, and takes an emotionally fortifying swig of his margarita.

“There’s a lot of parts where you’re talking and it cuts off all weird,” Bill goes on, “because Paul was in editing, stopping you from rambling about something stupid.”

“That,” says Paul, “is incredibly true.”

“I don’t know about _a lot of parts_ ,” Erasmus mutters.

“But I like it,” Bill says. “The show. It made me think that maybe cooking for your family could be fun. And maybe I’d like to try it sometime, if ... if I ever came back here. Even though my dad said I wasn’t going to. So now that I am, that’s why I want to eat at home.”

“That’s really nice,” says Paul, his voice choked.

He doesn’t dare look at Erasmus. No fucking way.

Until he does. Sure enough, Erasmus’s eyes are bright with tears.

“Bill,” Paul says in that same choked voice, getting up, “we just have to go grab the--”

“Sauce,” Erasmus supplies, standing up too. “Or as our Mexican amigos call it, _la salsa_.”

“What sauce?” Bill asks. “The salsa’s right here.”

“You want to try a margarita?” Erasmus calls over his shoulder. “We’ll go get you a margarita.”

“No we won’t!” Paul corrects. “But -- we’ll be right back.”

+

They just make it into the kitchen before the waterworks start.

“Oh, shit,” Paul says, eyes stinging, heart seizing up in a way that makes the panic attacks sound fun and fancy-free. “Oh, fuck.”

“This is what it’s like, is it?” Erasmus asks, tears trickling down his face. “Having a child? Feeling like your heart’s being ripped from your ribcage at any given moment??”

“Why are you asking me? You’re the one who’s a god damn parent.”

“I think we both know you got more parenting experience in the time before with Bill than I did in thirty years.”

“True,” Paul says, then adds, “And thanks for acknowledging it.”

(They’ve agreed that the main advantage of going to counseling together is making fun of their lame therapist afterwards--who says roasting someone can’t be a love language?--but all right, it’s helping with communication, too.)

“I’ve heard the adage about your heart walking around outside your chest. I’ve felt it before with him. But how do we stand it? Knowing that we let him go into that alone, and he could’ve died?”

“There’s nothing we could have done,” Paul protests. Even he can hear how hollow the words sound. “He was with his dad. You remember what the lawyer said--”

“I know.” Erasmus slumps against the counter. “But it doesn’t stop you feeling you’ve failed in some really horrible, fundamental, unforgivable way, does it?”

“No,” Paul agrees quietly, slumping next to him. “It doesn’t.”

“If it makes you feel any better, I’ve failed much worse than you have. If I’d tried to be a father when Beau was young, I probably could’ve broken the chain of bad parenting. Or at least chipped it.”

“Weirdly enough, it doesn’t make me feel better.”

“Doesn’t it? You usually love it when I admit I’ve fucked up.”

“I usually do. This is very bizarre for me.”

Erasmus laughs slightly and reaches for Paul’s hand. “I just want him to be happy. Happy enough to make up for everything he should have always had.”

“Me too,” Paul says, knitting his fingers with Erasmus’s.

They look at each other, and Paul is struck again by how weird it is to be ten years in and feel, somehow, like you’re starting all over. Like you’ve been given the world’s most terrifying, wonderful gift and there’s only one other person in the world who gets it.

“We’re going wind up getting a fucking dog, aren’t we?” he says.

“Probably,” Erasmus says with a weary sigh. “And we can’t feed it to a coyote this time, no matter how annoying it is. The last thing that boy needs is more trauma.”

“We didn’t _feed_ the terrier to that coyote,” Paul protests.

“True.” Erasmus grimaces. “We just didn’t _not_ feed it to that coyote.”

“Well, when you say it like that, it only sounds vaguely sociopathic.” Paul groans. “Oh man, we’re gonna have to get our shit together. Even more than we already have.”

“A whole life of trying to get our shit together stretches out before us,” Erasmus agrees ominously.

“You up for it?” Paul asks.

Erasmus squeezes his hand. “No idea.”

“Me either.”

“But,” Erasmus says after a moment, his eyes watering again, “he watched the show.”

“He watched the show,” Paul echoes. He reaches over to wipe away the tear that slips down Erasmus’s face, then strokes his wet cheek. “I can’t believe you’re not wearing bronzer.”

“Oh, I am. It’s just really good bronzer. The waterproof stuff.”

Paul laughs. “You know, I’ll still put up with you if you embrace having the natural pallor of an Englishman.”

“But not on shooting days,” Erasmus tests.

“Well, no, not on shooting days. What are you, insane?”

“Shooting days,” Erasmus says wistfully, putting a hand to his heart, “when we shoot the show that he watched while he was taken away, so he could feel close to us again--”

“If you set me off again, I swear to God--”

“I know you’re crying in here,” comes Bill’s voice from where he’s tactfully lingering in the hallway.

“What a ludicrous accusation.” Erasmus lunges for a kitchen towel and frantically wipes his face with it, then tosses it to Paul so he can dab his eyes.

“You don’t have to cry.” Bill walks into the kitchen. “I’m okay.”

“We know you’re okay,” Paul says, patting his shoulder.

“Better than okay,” Erasmus adds, ruffling Bill’s hair. “You’re flourishing.”

“But that doesn’t change the fact that we hate knowing what you went through,” Paul says. “We wish we had been there to spare you from that pain.”

Bill stares thoughtfully at them. An expression that Paul can’t quite decipher flickers over his face. It hurts to know someone so young can look like that.

“Me too,” he says at last. “But you were there in the hospital. And we’re all here now.”

“Yes, we are,” Erasmus says warmly, wrapping an arm around Bill’s shoulders. “And we’re not going anywhere, any of us, are we?”

“We sure aren’t,” Paul agrees.

“Except Disneyland,” Bill says.

“Have we really landed on Disneyland?” Erasmus asks delicately.

“It’s a conversation,” Bill says with the air of a parent negotiating a curfew.

“You hear that, hon?” Paul says. “It’s a conversation.”

“Yippie,” drawls Erasmus.

“Can I still try a margarita?” Bill asks, staring curiously at the pitcher on the counter.

“Sure,” Paul relents, figuring a few sips won’t get back to that drag Melissa from CPS, at the same time that Erasmus bellows, “No!”

They stare at each other.

“It’s possible we’re still figuring out this parenting lark,” Erasmus says with great dignity.

“I know,” Bill says, unbothered. “That’s okay. You’re better at it than you think you are.”

“How about we mix up some virgin margaritas, huh?” Paul offers.

“What does ‘virgin margaritas’ mean?”

“In this case,” Paul says, taking the easy way out, “it means there’s no alcohol in them.”

“In other cases,” adds Erasmus, “best not get into it.”

"Why even bring that up?" Paul demands of him.

Erasmus raises his hands in a sweeping _mea culpa_ gesture.

“I know what a virgin is,” Bill says. “I know all that stuff. I’m not five.”

‘THANK GOD HE’S IN THERAPY,’ Paul mouths to Erasmus over Bill’s head.

Erasmus nods and mouths back, ‘DON’T I KNOW IT.’

“I notice when you guys do that, you know,” Bill says.

“No you don’t,” Erasmus says serenely.

“Virgin margarita time, hooray!” cheers Paul, drumming on the counter.

+

Between cooking dinner, the two batches of margaritas, and an impromptu decision that Funfetti cupcakes are an essential bedtime snack (homemade, not from a box; they’re not animals), the kitchen is a wreck by the time Bill’s settled in bed with some Harry Potter and the Unfortunate Wimpy Kid Games book. Erasmus also left a pile of his own books on Bill’s bedside table, insisting that aspiring chefs have to study up before they can take to the kitchen and soar. (“When have you ever read a book in your entire life?” Paul asked, at which point Erasmus went conveniently deaf.)

“Jesus,” Paul says now, dismayed, as he takes in the sight. “We’re going to have to leave the cleaning staff a tip the size of your ego.”

“Firstly,” Erasmus says, “I’m a little disappointed in the way you chose to end that sentence.”

Paul chuckles. “I bet you are.”

“And secondly: the night doesn’t have to be over yet.”

“Oh?”

Erasmus throws an apron on with aplomb. Then he extends his hand.

“Paul Morgan,” he says soberly. “Light of my life, thrill of my loins, my partner in parenting and gifting the world with exquisite television: will you clean this profoundly disgusting kitchen with me?”

Paul pretends to think it over way longer than he needs to.

“I will,” he says ceremoniously, resting his hand in Erasmus’s.

Erasmus grins and twirls him toward the sink like they’re dancing. They’re dancing a lot lately, for two people who had almost forgotten the steps.


End file.
